What's the best bit of music software you've ever bought?

[surfer01]

Hey boys and girls.

Im wondering what's the best software you've ever bought. (Same kind of thinking as hardware.)
Has anyone tried Musicked double bass software? And last week someone brought out an app for the iPhone called "idouble bass"
Please let me know?

Links:http://idoublebass.com/iDouble_Bass/iDouble_Bass_Home.html
musicked.com/musicked/pages/.../Double-Bass-lessons.htm

[Eight]

Transcribe! is probably the one I use most... and it was cheap...

[Bilbo]

Transcribe is certainly one I have used a lot and recommend but only to facilitate the transcription of stuff into something like Sibelius which is th esoftware I woudl suggest is my no.1 . My version is Sibleius 2 (apparently written during the Boer War) but it still delivers what I want from it. I would love to upgrade to Sibelius 6 but I haven't got £600 to blow on software!!!

I also use Cubase but would love to get into Pro Tools but, again, can't afford it.

[BottomE]

Cubase - does everything and a hell of a lot more than i will ever need. Magic.

[BottomEndian]

So far, probably BFD2. It lets me play the drum parts I have in my head (and it sounds great doing it), rather than the ones I can physically manage.

Next purchase may be Omnisphere. I love a good complicated synth.

[xilddx]

Reaper. £25 instead of £370 for Logic, and it seems to be as fully featured. Amazing!

[burno70]

Traktion, a virtually idiot proof sequencer. I only need a basic recording and mixing program and it does this with ease plus a lot more beside.

[Dood]

[quote name='silddx' post='1241838' date='May 23 2011, 04:37 PM']Reaper. £25 instead of £370 for Logic, and it seems to be as fully featured. Amazing![/quote]

Yes sir, plus the one million! It truly is an awesome DAW and in some cases offers functionality that the other more expensive (and mentally frustrating) apps simply can not. Install and run the whole application from a USB key anyone? Yes, thank you very much!


2nd place goes to Guitar Pro 6


3rd place goes to Toontrack's Superior 2 drums.


oh wait.. ummm... Ampeg SVX by IK Multimedia is an awesome plug in for your DAW.


Hmmm.. and for ease of use - Line 6 USB Audio interfaces featuring the POD hardware, such as the GX, UX1,UX2, UX8 etc - recording demos has never been so easy!

[MythSte]

[quote name='silddx' post='1241838' date='May 23 2011, 04:37 PM']Reaper. £25 instead of £370 for Logic, and it seems to be as fully featured. Amazing![/quote]

+1!

[noelk27]

Could list a whole bundle of plug-ins that were flavour of the month, and some that were truly essential, but the best piece of software has to be Propellerhead Record. After years of slogging away with Cubase and Pro Tools, and trying to integrate with Cakewalk and Logic, switching to Record was the best decision I've ever made.

If not Record, then the nod would go to various reverb plug-ins from Lexicon, or plug-ins of Lexicon hardware. In fact, itching to get hold of the latest UA Lexicon 224 plug-in.

[LukeFRC]

i got iTunes with my mac- thats pretty good!

[Skol303]

Interesting question this one... bound to garner personal preferences, but mine would be:

1. Propellerhead Reason/Record/ReCycle (yeah, I know that's actually three softwares but heh, sue me!). Revolutionised the way I make music at a time when Cubase was the 'modus operandi' for most bedroom beginners. Allows me to turn those fleeting melodies into workable tracks before they have time to vanish from my mind... plus, being an ex-hardware user, I just love the interface. Lots of lovely wires to play with and knobs to twiddle (stop sniggering at the back, I hear ya...).

2. Reaper. Best bang for your buck by far. 'Nuff said.

3. Audacity. A superb piece of freeware; I still use it today.

...and sneaking in at number 4. would be another Props' software: Rebirth. Kinda dated now, but back in the heady days of acid house it truly ruled. Can't beat those squelchy 303s in my opinion

...and as a cheeky iPhone favourite, I'd have to say Nanostudio. It's literally a portable DAW on your phone. By far the best music app on the iOS.

[GarethFlatlands]

[quote name='silddx' post='1241838' date='May 23 2011, 04:37 PM']Reaper. £25 instead of £370 for Logic, and it seems to be as fully featured. Amazing![/quote]

+2 or 3 or whatever we're up to.

From rough song idea working to proper recording, can't beat it for value/functionality. Love it.

[Sawtooth]

[Sawtooth]

OK!!! I'll stop now!

Personally, Cubase originally introduced me to the infinite possibilities of DAW control, via plug ins etc and I got everything I could lay my hands on and went mad with them
But, I soon realised that the probability of learning to master all of these programs would have taken [i]many[/i] lifetimes.
Now, I've really pared it down to some decent hardware and now limit my own software usage, because I feel more 'in control'.

It's both hardware and software, but 'Native Instruments - Maschine' tickles my muse at the mo.

[Hutch82]

[size=3][font="Verdana"]Has to be Reaper and Band In A Box indespensible


H[/font][/size]

[lowdown]

A Daw's a Daw......
But i can't live with out Kontakt 4.



Garry

[paul_5]

i've had a few daw's over the years. I love protools now, but my best recent find is ezdrummer. I use for everything.

[b]Edit[/b] Also loving Sibelius. Got version 4 and love it, use it more than a DAW to be honest.

Edited May 23, 2011 by paul_5

[TimR]

I'm with Bilbo for Sibelius for transcription software.

Goldwave for editing wave and MP3 files.

I also bought something called Acoustica MP3 mixer. Which allows you to speed up and slow down and fade bits of tracks to mix them. I use it to make a seamless "mix tape" to play at gigs during breaks instead of a DJ.

An early version of Cubase came bundled with my soundblaster soundcard and Cubase Lite came bundled with my Zoom recorder. I used it to record my band a few times but found it's quicker, easier and more professional to go to a studio and get someone to concentrate on twiddling the knobs while I twiddle my bass.

Edited May 23, 2011 by TimR

[dougal]

I'm surprised no-one's mentioned "[url="http://renegademinds.com/Products/GuitarDrumTrainer/tabid/65/Default.aspx"]Guitar Drum Trainer[/url]":

Since I migrated to OSX I've stopped using it, but it was always my favourite looper / slower downer / EQ for learning songs. (I'm now using "amazing slow downer" which isn't nearly as good)

+1 for Guitar Pro. I think TuxGuitar does the same thing for free, but being able to isolate difficult bass lines, loop them at 50% speed & then make them gradually get faster is a godsend. (Requires accurate gpx files which aren't always easy to find) I've also used it to program in the piano parts for my grade pieces on double bass.

I'm glad there are Reaper fans out there: I could never get it working properly on my PC, all sorts of latency issues & it would lock inexplicably. I'm sure it was particular to my hardware / software combination, as I'm the only one I know who had problems.

I'm using Logic now, which I'm now used to. This is my third DAW (used guitar trax 2 & sonar previously) and I'm not sure I'm enough of a a power user to actually be able to differentiate between them. Not being able to use standard VST plug-ins is a pain, but I can't being myself to shell out the money or time to learn yet another interface!

Oh, and metronomeonline.com gets an honourable mention. I've used that a lot too.

[Wil]

[quote name='burno70' post='1241846' date='May 23 2011, 04:41 PM']Traktion, a virtually idiot proof sequencer. I only need a basic recording and mixing program and it does this with ease plus a lot more beside.[/quote]

Same here, I love Traktion. So simple to use and get good results with.

[Kiwi]

Native Instruments Guitar Rig Kontrol

[51m0n]

I am pretty hard to please when it comes to a DAW, mainly because I was used to working on a desk with patchbays, and basically that lets you plug pretty much anything into anything - you may release the magic, or just the magic smoke, but you can do it.

The only DAW I have found that lets me do this is Reaper. Some of the grouping arrangements I come up with to help make a mix I am pretty sure you cant do in any other DAW at all.

For instance I can make a group at anytime, put in a track with a reverb fx vst, put in a another couple of groups of tracks then change the number of audio channels in each of those groups , then arrange the sends from the tracks in those groups to go through the different channels, and send all of theose channels to the reverb. Why would I want to do this? It solves one of the biggest headaches in using aux fx off groups, that when you change the level of the group fader it doesn't change the level of the track sends to the aux. This may not sound like much, but it is very very significant to me as it means I cna reuse a single instance of a VST for multiple groups, which in turn saves huge amounts of processing cycles :0)

For £25 that is simply staggering. Add in the superb fx it comes with, one of the best gates and certainly one of the best compressors (and multiband compressors) and an EQ that is sublime and you can not beat that particular package IMO.

The rest of the time I use almost entirely free VSTs, the Bootsy stuff is amazing (not that Bootsy!), Molot is a phenominal drum buss compressor, FishFillets are fantastic, SIR reverb is mind boggling especially since you can now get Eventide H3000 and Acoustica M7 pulses free to run in it!

Edited May 24, 2011 by 51m0n

[KevB]

Guitar Pro for me, wouldn't have been able to learn enough songs in time to get through some auditions without it.

[BottomEndian]

Hmmm. Seems I should take another look at Reaper. I had a play with it a year or two ago, but it just didn't seem very "finished" on OS X. Most plugins didn't have their proper GUIs, it seemed to need a few little workarounds to get the I/O going... all the sorts of little things that put me off. I'll cast aside my memories of last time and try again.